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Sunday, December 18, 2016

Hang in there; it's almost over

How many different ways can one say how bad the Browns are
this season as they chug along on the Winless Season Express?

Thank goodness there are only two more games left to dwell
on that subject.

The inconsistency of this team in every phase of the game
this season is mind rattling. Game in and game out, there appears to be no
rhyme or reason as to what the coaches want the players to do for 60 minutes.
Either that or the players are incapable of fulfilling those wants.

It isn’t just one particular area that has contributed to
the most embarrassing season in what used to be the illustrious and proud
history of this franchise. It is in all areas. And the great fans of this team,
dwindling by the moment, do not deserve it.

Quarter by quarter, possession by possession, play by play, this
team epitomizes what bad football is all about. And it is getting worse as the
stigma of being only the second team in National Football League history to
lose 16 games in one season looms.

The Browns have only two cracks left at ending this
nightmare, which reached 14 straight losses this season and 17 overall with Sunday’s
33-13 humiliation against the Bills in suburban Buffalo.

The first is next Saturday in the home finale against the
San Diego Chargers with the season finale set for New Year’s Day in Pittsburgh,
which means they really have only one crack unless they can pull off the
biggest upset in this lopsided series since the 1999 expansion team knocked off
the Steelers, 16-15, in Pittsburgh.

It’s high time coach Hue Jackson flat out admits this team
is not good enough win football games. Way too often, it can’t get out of its
own way. When plays need to be made, they are not and for a very good reason.
The roster lacks playmakers.

There is not one player on this team who can be labeled a
clutch performer. Someone who steps up, takes charge and leads the way.
Leadership by example is noticeably absent on the field.

It is one thing to not know how a team is going to play from
game to game because every game is different. But with the 2016 Browns, the
mystery of how they will play disappears the moment they show up.

Whether it’s the defense being shredded in the run game or
an offense that knows not the meaning of the word consistent, the Browns’
weekly – or is it weakly – effort is nothing more than that . . . an effort.
With few exceptions this season, this team tries and it tries hard.

And therein lies the problem. If effort translated into
something – anything – resembling a victory, all this wrangling and gnashing about
the joyless, winless season would be relatively unnecessary.

The specter of losing every game is now very real and
therefore ratchets up the pressure to win. No one wants to be the team the 2016
Cleveland Browns beats and will work that much harder to avoid that
embarrassment.

The Bills, whose only two victories in the last seven games
came against teams that have totaled three victories this season, made certain
they would not be that team with a relentless ground game and fierce pass rush.

After giving up 460 yards in last Sunday’s loss to
Pittsburgh, including 236 to Steelers running back Le’Veon Bell and putting up
only 67 of their own on the ground, they arrived Sunday with a whole different
mind-set against the Browns.

LeSean McCoy, arguably the best running back in the NFL,
hammered the Cleveland defense all afternoon.He ran for 153 of the Bills’ 280 rushing yards and scored
twice on only 19 carries, ripping off runs of 20, 24, 19, 10, and 17 yards,
adding 14 more yards on a swing pass.

The Buffalo front seven partially erased last week’s
humiliation, dropping Cleveland quarterback Robert Griffin III five times,
making him evacuate the pocket on six other occasions to avoid a sack because
he had problems all day locating open receivers and generally manhandling the
Cleveland offensive line.

The Browns’ offense, which seems to be getting worse by the
game, produced just 269 net yards and went three and out on half of its 10
possessions. It gained those yards in only 54 plays, aided immensely by a
nine-play, 72-yard drive on its last possession. It owned the ball for a shade
less than 26 minutes.

But that offense somehow managed to pull within 17-10 of the
Bills with nine minutes left in the third quarter, The Third scoring on an
18-yard scramble after, yep, failing to find an open receiver.

The Bills, who had taken what seemed to be a commanding 17-3
halftime lead on a Mike Gillislee short run and 20-yard touchdown pass to tight
end Charles Clay, answered immediately with a six-play, 75-yard drive, McCoy
going the final four yards for the first of his scores. He added an 8-yard
scoring run on the next series.

The offense paid two other visits to the red zone and came
away with only a pair of Cody Parkey field goals

On the second possession of the game, The Third drove his
men down to the Buffalo 5 before slamming it in reverse. And this is where the
inconsistency on that side of the ball comes in.

Three plays from the 5 netted minus yardage, winding up at
the 17 after The Third was sacked twice for losses of four and six yards and Isaiah
Crowell, whose 25-yard burst early in the drive got the ball to the 17, was
dropped for a two-yard loss.

On the second red-zone visit, a 28-yard connection with
tight end Gary Barnidge plus a questionable roughing-the-passer call on Bills
linebacker Zach Brown (The Third was scrambling on the play) placed the ball at
the Buffalo 13 late in the third quarter.

What would go wrong this time? You just knew that in this
season of despair and misery, something would go wrong at the wrong time. And
sure enough, it did. This time, it was backward march again, courtesy of a hold
by the usually reliable Joe Thomas.

The ball eventually wound up at the Buffalo 22 after an
incomplete pass, another Crowell loss from scrimmage and a three-yard scramble
by the Third. Yet another microcosm moment in a season full of them.

And as he watched his team fall apart in so many different
ways, Jackson, who seemed rooted in one spot most of the afternoon, merely shook
his head in what seemed to be bewilderment at just how bad this team is.

It’s almost as though this is all a nightmare and isn’t
really happening. That is what makes it that much harder to take and
understand.

2 comments:

I've been a Browns fan since the days of Jim Brown. I've lived thru "red right 88", "the drive", "the fumble" and "the move", but this has got to be the lowest point in what used to be a proud franchise. You can attest that I have always seen the glass as half full but the sad truth is that the glass is now completely empty. I would like to think that next year will be better but, I just don't see it. No viable QB, a totally inept defense, receivers that can't separate, a coach who abandons the run halfway thru the game, the list just keeps getting longer. You tell me what there is to be optimistic?